Radicals in power : the New Left experience in office / Eric Leif Davin.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Davin, Eric Leif.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Politicians--United States--Biography.

Politicians.

Elections.

History.

New Left.

United States.

United States--Officials and employees--Biography.

Radicals--United States--Biography.

Radicals.

Socialists--United States--Biography.

Socialists.

New Left--United States--History.

Elections--United States--History--20th century.

Elections--United States--History--21st century.

Progressivism (United States politics)--History.

Progressivism (United States politics).

United States--Politics and government--1945-1989.

Politics and government.

United States--Politics and government--1989-.

Genre:

Biographies.

Physical Description:

xx, 299 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Lanham : Lexington Books, [2012]

Summary:

Our memory of 1960s New Left radicals often evokes marches in the streets, battles with the police, or urban bombings. However, the New Left was a multifaceted movement, with diverse tendencies. One of these tendencies promoted the electoral route as the way to change America. In every city that was a center of New Left activism, this "Electoral New Left" entered the political arena. A surprisingly large number of these New Left radicals were elected to office: city council, mayor, state senate, even the U.S. Senate. Once in office, they persisted and prevailed. Cities and places we think of today as eternally liberal-Berkeley, Madison, Ann Arbor, even the state of Vermont-were deeply conservative and deeply Republican before the triumphs of the local Electoral New Left. These "radicals in power," however, brought about a lasting political realignment in their locales, and embodied the vision of a better future that was at the heart of all New Left activism.

Until now the accomplishments of the Electoral New Left, even its very existence, have been almost completely unexplored. Historians of the social and political movements of the 1960s have focused on anti-Vietnam War protest movements, or on the Revolutionary New Left. Radicals in Power corrects that oversight and, in doing so, rewrites the history of the Sixties and the New Left. Based on interviews with the elected New Left radicals in each of their cities, Davin details the birth and evolution of a local and regional progressive politics that has, heretofore, been overlooked. Book jacket.

Contents:

Introduction: From Protest to Power : The Electoral New Left and the Long Sixties

The Liberation of Berkeley

A Freak for Sheriff

Kent State...And After

Madison: Two Wars at Home

The People's Party

Passing Through: Human Rights in Ann Arbor

Digging In: Human Rights in Ypsilanti

Urbana: Power on the Prairie

Marx in Motown

Democratic Socialists of America

Boston: A Socialist on Beacon Hill

Santa Cruz: Surf City Socialists

Vermont Exceptionalism

Conclusion: The Electoral New Left and Local Left Populism.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780739174968

0739174967

9780739174975

0739174975

OCLC:

794922748